Latest / Overwhelmed Working Woman: Boost Productivity, Master Time Management, Overcome Overwhelm & Stop People Pleasing / #275| Top Hidden Signs You're in High Functioning Burnout and Why You Still Feel Empty Inside (Even Though You Look Successful On The Outside)
Transcript
- 0:00Michelle Gauthier: When you listen today, you're going to learn if you are in high-functioning burnout and what to do if that is the case.
- 0:06Michelle Gauthier: You're listening to Overwhelmed Working Woman, the podcast that helps you be more calm and more productive by doing less.
- 0:18Michelle Gauthier: I'm your host, Michelle Gauthier, a former Overwhelmed Working Woman and current life coach.
- 0:23Michelle Gauthier: On this show, we unpack the stress and pressure that today's Working Woman experiences.
- 0:28Michelle Gauthier: And in each episode, you'll get a strategy to bring more calm, ease, and relaxation to your life.
- 0:35Michelle Gauthier: Hi, friend, thanks for joining today.
- 0:39Michelle Gauthier: Today we're going to be talking about high-functioning burnout.
- 0:42Michelle Gauthier: I recently learned of this term, and when I understood what it was, I thought, oh my gosh, yes, that was me.
- 0:48Michelle Gauthier: I wish I had known that I was in high-functioning burnout before I basically burned it all down, quit my corporate job, got divorced, all the things.
- 0:57Michelle Gauthier: When you listen to this episode today, you'll learn the pink flags of high functioning burnout, what this is, and why you don't have to hit rock bottom, why the most burned out people are also the ones getting the most praise for it, because the things that make us feel burned out are the things that our boss and our family loves that we do.
- 1:16Michelle Gauthier: Why the fix isn't doing more or less of the same things and what to do as a first step to start shifting yourself out if you are identifying as a person who is in high functioning burnout.
- 1:28Michelle Gauthier: Stick with me on this one because I'm going to tell you exactly what I wish someone had told me back in 2017.
- 1:34Michelle Gauthier: So high functioning burnout, this term is getting a lot of attention right now.
- 1:38Michelle Gauthier: It's sometimes also called a high functioning freeze state.
- 1:42Michelle Gauthier: And when I read about it, something just clicked for me immediately because I lived this and I didn't have a name for it.
- 1:49Michelle Gauthier: I didn't even pause to think what is going on with me.
- 1:52Michelle Gauthier: But here's what high functioning burnout can look like.
- 1:55Michelle Gauthier: You look like you're successful on the outside.
- 1:57Michelle Gauthier: You're executing pretty well.
- 1:59Michelle Gauthier: It's not like you're falling apart and you can't do your job anymore.
- 2:02Michelle Gauthier: In fact, maybe even better than fairly well, and your calendar's full and your to-do list gets pretty much done, and people look at your life and think you're killing it.
- 2:12Michelle Gauthier: But underneath it all, you basically feel dead inside.
- 2:15Michelle Gauthier: Not sad exactly, just numb and going through the motions.
- 2:19Michelle Gauthier: You might be always exhausted, but you push through anyway because that's what you do.
- 2:23Michelle Gauthier: That's the thing that makes you row a birthday party for your eight-year-old that is very extensive and takes a lot of work, even though you're completely exhausted from your work week.
- 2:34Michelle Gauthier: Exhaustion just kind of becomes your baseline.
- 2:37Michelle Gauthier: And the things that used to be fun for you just aren't that fun anymore.
- 2:40Michelle Gauthier: You're not really having any fun.
- 2:42Michelle Gauthier: You're getting through the day and then the next day, and then the next day, and the day after that.
- 2:46Michelle Gauthier: I will share with you my version of this because I think it might help you understand what this high functioning burnout is.
- 2:53Michelle Gauthier: But back in 2017, I had, you know, the usual story that I've talked about here on the podcast where I had a stressful job.
- 3:01Michelle Gauthier: I traveled quite a bit.
- 3:03Michelle Gauthier: I was a mom, just trying to do everything for my kids all the time.
- 3:07Michelle Gauthier: And I did everything else too.
- 3:10Michelle Gauthier: I was working out all the time.
- 3:12Michelle Gauthier: I volunteered at my church.
- 3:14Michelle Gauthier: I was the room mom.
- 3:16Michelle Gauthier: And I remember just feeling like I was going through the motions checking boxes.
- 3:20Michelle Gauthier: And I kept thinking that I would feel different once I got there.
- 3:23Michelle Gauthier: There and air quotes.
- 3:25Michelle Gauthier: I don't know what the there was once I hit the next milestone, but it never did.
- 3:29Michelle Gauthier: So I thought getting a promotion was going to make me feel better.
- 3:32Michelle Gauthier: I thought once I had kids, I would feel like I had everything I wanted.
- 3:35Michelle Gauthier: Maybe that once I had the second child that I would feel like I had everything I wanted.
- 3:39Michelle Gauthier: And it's not that I wasn't grateful for all that I had.
- 3:41Michelle Gauthier: I really was, but I just felt like I was going through the motions and checking boxes all day long.
- 3:48Michelle Gauthier: And I just kept going and going and going until eventually, this is really summarizing the story quickly, I ended up quitting my job and getting divorced and selling my house, and my whole life kind of came apart all at once.
- 4:01Michelle Gauthier: And I look back now and I wish so badly that I had recognized what was happening back then.
- 4:06Michelle Gauthier: I wish I had this opportunity to see a pink flag before it became a red flag instead of just finding out the hard way.
- 4:13Michelle Gauthier: I read about high-functioning burnout for the first time this past week and thought, yeah, that's it.
- 4:18Michelle Gauthier: That's exactly what I was in.
- 4:20Michelle Gauthier: It took me years to have the language for something that I lived through in real time.
- 4:24Michelle Gauthier: So if any of this is landing for you right now, that looking good but feeling empty thing, I want you to hear me.
- 4:30Michelle Gauthier: It's not nothing.
- 4:32Michelle Gauthier: It's a pink flag and it's worth paying attention to now before it becomes the kind of thing that takes your job or your relationship or your health down with it.
- 4:40Michelle Gauthier: Normally when you hear a story about burnout, what you hear is that the person ended up getting super sick or losing their job or losing their mind.
- 4:50Michelle Gauthier: They get to the point where they just cannot go on anymore.
- 4:54Michelle Gauthier: But here's the thing that makes high-functioning burnout so dangerous.
- 4:57Michelle Gauthier: It's kind of invisible because the exact behaviors that are burning you out are the ones that are getting you praised.
- 5:02Michelle Gauthier: The compliment I used to love was, I don't know how you do it all.
- 5:06Michelle Gauthier: And people say that to you, and nobody around can see what it's costing you because all they see is the output, like the job getting done.
- 5:15Michelle Gauthier: Your kids are fed with healthy food, the birthday party has a theme.
- 5:19Michelle Gauthier: There's no reason to intervene because from the outside everything looks fine.
- 5:22Michelle Gauthier: And that's the reason why nobody's gonna catch it for you.
- 5:25Michelle Gauthier: Nobody's gonna be like, hey friend, what's going on?
- 5:28Michelle Gauthier: You seem like you're really sort of falling apart here, because it appears that you've got everything together.
- 5:33Michelle Gauthier: You're doing a great job hiding it even from yourself.
- 5:36Michelle Gauthier: I definitely was hiding it from myself.
- 5:38Michelle Gauthier: I really didn't acknowledge that I had any kind of problem.
- 5:41Michelle Gauthier: The problem that I would have described is I'm just so busy all the time and it just doesn't feel good inside.
- 5:48Michelle Gauthier: And here's where I want to push back on something, because it matters a lot to me.
- 5:51Michelle Gauthier: If you're in this, the advice you might hear everywhere is just to hustle harder and optimize more or find a better system or try to squeeze more out of your day.
- 6:00Michelle Gauthier: And I think that's wrong.
- 6:02Michelle Gauthier: Honestly, it bothers me because that's the opposite of what actually works.
- 6:06Michelle Gauthier: And you don't have to quit your job and you don't have to get divorced, you don't have to become a completely different kind of person or a completely different kind of mom.
- 6:15Michelle Gauthier: What you actually need is to learn how to get out of high-functioning burnout, and that's mostly a mindset change, learning to do less and changing the belief that your productivity is your worth.
- 6:26Michelle Gauthier: That last part is really important because it's probably unconscious, but somewhere in there you believe that what you produce is what makes you valuable.
- 6:35Michelle Gauthier: And that's why you can't stop even when you're exhausted.
- 6:38Michelle Gauthier: It's why I don't know how you do it all feels like something to protect instead of something to worry about.
- 6:44Michelle Gauthier: And doing more won't fix this.
- 6:46Michelle Gauthier: Doing less and thinking differently about what makes you worthy will.
- 6:50Michelle Gauthier: This is exactly the kind of shift that I help my clients make.
- 6:55Michelle Gauthier: I do not recommend to my clients that they do like I did, which is quit your job, get divorced, burn it all down, and start over.
- 7:02Michelle Gauthier: Instead, I help them recognize what's going on.
- 7:05Michelle Gauthier: Let's catch this now and let's change your thinking and the actions that you're taking so that you can continue to keep that job that you once loved.
- 7:14Michelle Gauthier: Or you can have the clarity of mind to decide what you want to do instead.
- 7:18Michelle Gauthier: Or you can make the decision to have a happy marriage, or you can make the decision to get divorced, but you're making it from a place of a clear mind instead of this desperate, I just have to change something energy.
- 7:30Michelle Gauthier: So, in summary, high-functioning burnout doesn't look like burnout.
- 7:33Michelle Gauthier: It doesn't look like you're lying on the floor of your bathroom unable to do anything.
- 7:37Michelle Gauthier: It kind of looks like success.
- 7:39Michelle Gauthier: The differentiator is the way that you feel inside.
- 7:42Michelle Gauthier: If you're exhausted and numb and not having fun anymore, that is your big pink flag and not something to push through.
- 7:50Michelle Gauthier: The fix is not doing more.
- 7:52Michelle Gauthier: It's a mindset shift and it's absolutely something that I can teach you how to do.
- 7:57Michelle Gauthier: In fact, this is my specialty.
- 7:58Michelle Gauthier: I can't even count how many clients I've had who have come to me feeling absolutely miserable and overwhelmed in their jobs and they want to change their job.
- 8:06Michelle Gauthier: And the thing that we work on is before you decide to change your job, let's just make it so that you can do that job without feeling overwhelmed and burned out.
- 8:16Michelle Gauthier: And when they learn those skills and they do that and they all do it, they all are able to be less stressed by the jobs that they already have, be less stressed in managing their own household and their children.
- 8:27Michelle Gauthier: And when they do that, they can make a decision from a calm place.
- 8:31Michelle Gauthier: And honestly, a lot of times people stay at the job they have and end up enjoying it, or they have the clarity of mind to be like, actually, I really don't want to do this anymore.
- 8:39Michelle Gauthier: I think I'm gonna start my own business, or I think I'm going to change careers, or I'm just gonna change companies.
- 8:44Michelle Gauthier: Whatever it is, I can help you get out of that high-functioning burnout and back into that calm and clear mind that you need to decide your next step.
- 8:54Michelle Gauthier: Don't be like me and wait until your life falls apart to do something about it.
- 8:58Michelle Gauthier: I did that and I don't recommend it.
- 9:00Michelle Gauthier: Set up a free consultation with me.
- 9:02Michelle Gauthier: The link's in the show notes, and let's catch this now together.
- 9:06Michelle Gauthier: If you do a consultation with me about one-on-one coaching, you will tell me all about what's going on with you.
- 9:12Michelle Gauthier: We will talk through a high-level strategy of what we would do in coaching, and then you can decide if coaching feels like the right answer for you.
- 9:20Michelle Gauthier: The link to do that is in the show notes.
- 9:22Michelle Gauthier: Thank you for listening to the Overwhelmed Working Woman podcast.
- 9:29Michelle Gauthier: If you want to learn more about my work, head over to my website at michellegauthier.com.
- 9:35Michelle Gauthier: See you next week.